Quote (Palasan @ Nov 15 2022 10:32pm)
Russia does not possess enough non-nuclear weapons to level country the size of Ukraine to the ground.
And secondly - Putin sold Russian people the idea that Ukrainians are being held captive by insane Nazi regime and Azov and he is coming there to liberate them. His propaganda machine is working in overdrive to cover up the mass graves being discovered all over the place where Russian occupation occurred from the eyes of Russian general public for a reason. They even went as far as claiming that streets of Bucha videos was a hoax and paid actors played the role of corpses scattered throughout the streets. Providing videos from some protest rally not even in the Ukraine as "proof"
Russia has burnt out conventionally, we have seen their conventional capability for all it is, yes they can send Ukraine into energy crisis by destroying its energy infrastructure but on the battlefield, they are still attacking head-first, the only professional army in 21st century to use this dumb casualty intensive tactic from 18-20th century.
Might as well line up their army in lines as Napoleon era armies did, hand out drums and march forward with muskets to their death at this point. Trench warfare doesn't work either in 21st century, Ukrainians are outmaneuvering them and annihilating their flanks/supply lines 24-7.
I'd be very surprised if they didn't have enough weapons, but I dont think we will agree on what they have or what it would take.
And that's not really an accurate depiction of the Russian position, they view eastern Ukraine as historically Russian lands with majority Russian speaking and culturally Russian population who are being oppressed by western Ukraine for not conforming to the de russification of the region. They also view alot of the political upheaval that happened in Ukraine before the annexation of Crimea as western backed.
The nazi claims are propaganda, everyone's enemy is always the worst thing they can be. It isn't based in nothing though, a lot of the fighting in the separatist regions involved some very sketchy groups on ukraines behalf, doesn't mean Ukraine is controlled by some nazi regime like he said though.
I'm sure Russia probably has committed war crimes and lied about it, I don't really believe many claims that come from either Russia or Ukraine regarding those things though, I can go into why if you want.
I disagree they are burnt out, but I guess we will see. Either way hopefully there is some sort of ceasefire arrangement.